AirAsia captain 'left seat before crash'

The captain of the AirAsia jet that crashed into the sea in December was out of his seat conducting an unusual procedure when his co-pilot apparently lost control, two people familiar with the investigation said.

Details emerging of the final moments of flight QZ8501 are likely to focus attention partly on maintenance, procedures and training, though Indonesian officials have said it is still too early to draw firm conclusions.

The Airbus A320 jet plunged into the Java Sea while en route from Surabaya, Indonesia, to Singapore on December 28, killing all 162 people on board.

People familiar with the matter said this week that investigators were examining maintenance records of one of the automated systems, the Flight Augmentation Computer, and the way the pilots reacted to any outage.

After trying to reset the device, pilots pulled a circuit-breaker to cut its power, Bloomberg News reported on Friday.

People familiar with the matter said it was the Indonesian captain Iriyanto who took this step, rather than his less experienced French co-pilot Remy Plesel, who was flying the plane.

AirAsia said it would not comment while the matter was under investigation by the National Transportation Safety Committee.

Experts said the loss of the FAC would not directly alter the trajectory of the aircraft but would remove flight envelope protection, which prevents a pilot from taking a plane beyond its safety limits.

The decision to cut off the FAC has surprised people because the usual procedure for resetting it is to press a button on the overhead panel.

“You can reset the FAC, but to cut all power to it is very unusual,” said an A320 pilot, who declined to be identified.

The circuit breakers are on a wall panel behind the co-pilot and hard to reach from the seated position on the left side, where the captain sits, according to two experienced pilots and published diagrams of the cockpit.

Shortly after, the plane went into a sharp climb from which investigators have said it stalled or lost lift.

Lawyers for the family of the French co-pilot said they have filed a lawsuit against AirAsia for “endangering the lives of others” by flying the route without official authorization on that day.

AirAsia did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the lawsuit.

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